Warmth
by brightspark
Summary: GippalxBaralai. Warmth between two people from different races. Set preFFX time, when they were in the Crimson Squad.


Please excuse me if this is out of character or the details aren't quite right. I haven't quite finished FFX-2 yet, but I really wanted to play with Gippal and Baralai.

Gippal/Baralai, Gippal POV, pre-FFX, pre-me-finishing-FFX-2, vague smut, use of Al Bhed, length. The less vague version is on my LiveJournal, morbidevening. Read that at your own risk, but there's not much difference.

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**Gippal POV**

I'm an Al Bhed.

When I first joined the Crimson Squad, it was like that was all I was. An _Al Bhed_. You know. A curse. A disease. I was the 'Al Bhed member', as if I was something different, 'special', something, maybe, to be talked about in a hushed voice.

The Al Bhed are, I think, a warm race, amongst ourselves. We love pretty freely, and move on quickly, and value warmth and laughter - companionship, I guess - above the rest of it. When a relationship cools down, that's when we move on, with some good times gained and nothing lost. Sometimes people fall in love forever, and that's great, you know? But for the most part, we know that people change and relationships change, and we don't let ourselves get stuck.

When I joined the Crimson Squad, leaving my own people behind, I thought they were all cold. They weren't close in the way we were. There was Paine, always a little aloof, laughing with Nooj and Baralai but... distant from me. There was Nooj, and he was in a world of his own, he had his own agenda. And there was Baralai, soft spoken, quiet, obliging, and to me, he felt lukewarm. Half there. He wasn't warm, and he wasn't cold.

Sometimes, you see things, and they scare you. Chill you right down deep inside. The Al Bhed know that well, and instead of shutting it up, they try to combat it. If there had been an Al Bhed woman there that night, when I was half glued to the fire, I know she would have offered for me to spend the night with her, and I'd have accepted without any shame.

I had a feeling that Paine would laugh in my face if I suggested any such thing.

I can't remember what had spooked me that night. Might've been Nooj's craving for death - I didn't understand why he wanted to die so badly, still can't really grasp it, and that freaked me out. At home, I'd have known what to do. But with them, I stopped talking to everyone and I just stayed right next to the fire.

"Is something wrong, Gippal?"

I didn't want anything to do with him. I didn't want anything to do with his soft voice and his lukewarm personality. I wanted to go _home_. "Mayja sa ymuha."

"I'm afraid I can't speak your language very well. Why don't you talk in mine?" he asked, gently, moving to sit down next to me. He put a hand on my shoulder and I was surprised by the warmth - the warmth of both his hand and the gesture. "You look as if you need to see a friendly face."

"E haat yh Al Bhed pat," I snapped.

"Gippal... it's not fair to do that. You know, you push us all away. Can't a guy get to know you at all?" He looked a little pained, and I felt a tiny stab of guilt. He was trying, and I was being as cold to him as... well, as all the Yevonites were to me. I guess it wasn't very fair.

"E's cunno - I mean, I'm sorry."

He nodded slightly, a faint smile on his face that I assumed meant he'd forgiven me. "Do you miss your people?"

"I guess... I miss the way they'd act. If I was sitting like this back at home, somebody would come up and ask me to spend the night with them." I said it carelessly enough, but I was watching him like a hawk. Truthfully, it wasn't just women's beds I could be found in at times like these, and if I'd known Baralai would be at all agreeable, I wouldn't have hesitated to make an offer of my own for the night.

"Spend the night - oh." Cool, collected Baralai might've blushed then. I smirked at him a little, but then I felt the need to explain it a little more. I didn't want him to think badly of me because of that comment.

"We're... a warm people. We comfort like that."

"I think it's a good thing," he said, half shyly, surprising me.

I tried to laugh it off, tried to convince myself that something wasn't happening between us. I was an Al Bhed, the Al Bhed member of the Crimson Squad, one of the race that all his race hated. "Careful. I might think you're offering."

"Maybe I am," he said, quietly, not meeting my eyes. Baralai, calm, quiet, lukewarm Baralai was offering to share warmth and comfort in the Al Bhed way. For a moment, I wondered if he really understood what I meant, but I knew he did. He had to.

"Fruy..."

"Pardon?" Baralai asked, raising an eyebrow and giving me a smile that suddenly seemed like the warmest thing in the world. And I couldn't say anything, tongue tied like I hadn't been since some girl first asked me to spend the night with her. I decided to take it on faith that he really did know what he was offering, and I leaned closer, giving him plenty of time to back off. He didn't, so I...

Well, I kissed him, didn't I?

From lukewarm to just right, in the space of just a few minutes; as warm and close as any Al Bhed, he was in my arms, mouth against mine, warding off the chill that had settled in both of us during the day's work. I'd never imagined sharing warmth with someone who wasn't Al Bhed... but I wasn't complaining. It felt too right to taint it with that kind of thinking anyway.

He was more confident than I'd expected, pulling me away from the warmth of the fire, out of sight and earshot of the tent where Nooj and Paine were probably trying to get some sleep. His hands were warm, worming underneath my clothes and pushing them up and off and dropping them to the ground while I struggled to catch up, dropping his clothes on top of the pile. His warm hands. Making me warmer than I'd been in a long time.

"Oui'na payidevim," I said, honestly, and I didn't feel the need to translate. I'm sure he knew the kind of thing I would say. I'm not sure if he knew how sincere I was. I'm not sure if he knew, then, that I'd return to him again and again for more.

"You're so warm," Baralai whispered, pulling at me, tugging me down until we were laying on top of our clothes - the only thing we had handy to lie on.

"Fyns," I agreed, running my hands down his body, down his legs, kissing him again and smirking at the way his eyes closed, the way he was already panting softly for breath, warm and eager and a little flushed.

"Hu daycehk," he whispered, surprising the hell out of me, and then with a little mischievous smile, he kissed me harder than I was expecting. "Remember, I didn't say I can't speak Al Bhed - I just said I can't speak it very well."

"Your pronunciation is terrible, but you got me," I whispered back, pressing my mouth against his skin to muffle my soft laughter. "Well, have you got anything...?"

"In my pocket, hang on."

I let him up for a moment and he fiddled in his pocket, bringing out an unmarked bottle and putting it into my hand. I have no idea what it was, but it did the job, and that, really, was all that mattered, that night. "Have you done this before?"

"Tuac ed syddan?"

How many times had I heard that from some Al Bhed girl? Baralai was just full of surprises.

"No, it doesn't," I said, smirking at him, but I was still gentle with him. At first he looked vaguely uncomfortable, then, as I went further, maybe even pained, but when I pushed deeper still, his breath caught and his eyes widened and the faint flush on his face darkened.

"Wow," he whispered, and I took that as permission to stretch him further, hurrying a little now, trying to keep the balance between eagerness and hurting him. Finally --

"Can I?"

"Do it."

I pushed into him, slowly, half expecting it all to shatter now and to feel him lukewarm and... wrong. But no. He reached up, his arms wrapping round my neck, pressing himself against me. Nothing but warmth. Proving there's not such a huge difference between our races after all. We're both warm.

I held still for a moment, until that earned a frown from him and I had to move, thrusting in and out of him, small thrusts at first, and then harder, deeper. He was whimpering softly, and I reflected, distantly, that whimpers were the same in both languages. When I thrust deep inside him and he clenched around me, we both moaned, simultaneously, I forgot all about that, I could focus only on thrusting into him hard and fast.

"Vilg, E's kuehk du lusa," I whispered, and his arms tightened around me. So fucking warm, so fucking good. That was all I could think. I put my hand on him, helping him along, and he cried out, maybe surprised, maybe just about to lose it.

Thinking back, I don't remember coming. I just remember how good it was. How I saw stars. How I lay there on top of him as if I'd never move again. How he shifted slightly, curling his body so we were both comfortable. How we were silent, sharing warmth and forgetting the barriers of race.

"Gippal?"

"What is it?"

"...Nothing." Baralai dropped a light kiss on my jaw, closed his eyes, and went to sleep. I couldn't help thinking that Paine would throw a fit in the morning, and I couldn't help but grin with anticipation. Maybe baiting her later would be fun. 


End file.
